Religion: A Bid to the Lonely

Dr. Frederick May Eliot, veteran (for 15 years) president of the
American Unitarian Association, has his own estimate of the mood of
orthodox Protestantism today: "Black reaction and black pessimism." The
doctrine being emphasized, said Dr. Eliot at a Unitarian meeting in
Cincinnati, "is one of absolute despair, which sets up as the only
possible avenue of escape from cosmic disaster abject submission to
deity, the unquestioned acceptance of religious authoritarian creeds,
and the futility of human effort."

Unitarian Eliot noted with satisfaction that many in his church
(membership: 80,000) and in the...